Adrenaline, Alcohol, and Early Rebellion: A Teen's Road to Recovery

I'm a movie star now, huh?

Callie, alcoholic.

Is that David Figaro I see over there?

He probably doesn't recognize, yeah it is, Mr. AA.

He probably doesn't recognize you have it

with this tie on, do you?

Thanks, Ben, for inviting me out.

Thanks, Abraham, for your share.

You know, when I was a kid, I never seemed to really fit in.

I had three older brothers and one older sister,

and I was always trying to keep up.

And I learned from a very young age

that adrenaline was my first drug.

And I always was doing the crazy stuff.

They'd kick a ball in a tree, they'd say, "Go get it."

And I'd be up there just hanging in this tiny little limbs

and the whole branch is moving, and I loved it.

It was that adrenaline.

And so I was always looking for something.

And I'd probably get introduced to alcohol

at about 12 years old, and that was it.

I knew that was it, and I had that.

So we would go to the grocery stores and steal alcohol,

'cause obviously they're not gonna sell alcohol

to a 12-year-old, so we'd just grab whatever.

If you guys remember those little club cocktails in the can,

we'd go in the store and we'd drink like four,

and just right there in the refrigerator,

stick our head in there and just drink 'em real quick,

leave the empty cans, and leave.

And that was how we got alcohol, a little, you know.

And I had older brothers,

and they started giving me alcohol and stuff,

and it was off, and so I would drink as much as I could

when I could get it.

But back then, I grew up in Canoga Park,

so not too far from here, these mild stomping grounds.

And my brothers sold pot, and he was five years,

four years older than I was,

and all my friends wanted to buy it too,

but he wouldn't sell it to 'em

because his girlfriend didn't want everybody

coming over to the house, so he would only sell it to me,

and then I would sell it to everybody else,

so I became, you know, the good, you know?

So that, I would drive around,

I had to drive around with a little pager.

Remember those little pagers?

Beep, beep, beep.

I'm dating myself, right?

(laughing)

And the pager would go off, I'd call you back.

Yeah, okay, what do you want?

Okay, there's a delivery fee.

There's always a delivery fee, and everybody knew that.

And so they had to get me high when I show up,

so here I am getting high for free.

And then, you know, I was going through,

that was just normal, and back in the day,

I rode a Honda 754, and back then,

that was the Superbike of the era.

That bike, when I got on it, I weighed about a buck 20

back then, and I don't even think that bike

knew I was on the back.

I bought this bike, and there was the adrenaline again.

I tell ya, there was no helmet laws back then,

so you can't visit the 70s and you can wear your head long,

and have the Ray-Ban sunglasses on.

And they were good up to about 75 miles an hour,

and then your tears, your eyes would start to tear up,

you know, and the long hair flowing in the, you know,

as you're riding the bike, you know.

And I bought that bike, and it was the first day I had it,

and I was riding up Choup towards Sherman Way right there,

and I saw the light starting to change, starting to flash,

so I just gunned it.

Front end came up off the ground a little bit,

and I took off, and I flew through that intersection

at Sherman Way.

I am in office, I was going, and I was flying up

all the way to Roscoe, and I get up to Roscoe,

it's a red light, so I sit there waiting,

and I'm sitting there waiting, and looking for traffic,

and all of a sudden, I see something out of the corner

of my eye, and it was a motorcycle cop,

and he pulled up and he kicked my front tire.

He's all, "Pull over!"

I'm like, "Oh, shit."

And so I pull over, and, "So you know how long

"it took me to catch up to you?"

I'm like, "Well, if I knew you were back there,

"I wouldn't have stopped for the red light, you know?"

And so I was all upset, you know, not even 24 hours

with that motorcycle, I got a ticket for speeding.

And he looked at me and he said, "You know,

"if you hit the ground going that fast,

"you're not gonna survive it."

And at the time, I thought, "You know what?

"Maybe I don't care."

You know, I was just in it for the moment.

And so I was pretty upset about getting the ticket

that soon after getting the bike,

and he wrote me the ticket, and he said that I could go,

and I put the bike in gear, and I gassed it real hard,

and the front end came up off the ground,

and the tire spun, and he chased me down

and wrote me another ticket.

I was two tickets and less than 24 hours on that bike,

and it was just on from there.

I got, you know, I was an alcoholic, where do you get a job?

You know, where am I gonna work, right?

So I went over to, there used to be,

across from the Promenade Mall,

Vendome Liquor over there, inside there was a,

so I went there and applied for the job of the manager.

He must have known alcoholics, man.

He looked at me and he says, "No, you're not hiring."

I'm like, "All right, whatever, so I'm leaving."

And there was a little deli inside the liquor store,

and the assistant manager comes out and says,

"Hey, you want a job?"

She says, "I'll give you a job."

I'm like, "Okay, cool."

So I'm over there working in the deli,

and I'm not there more than about a month,

and then he's like, "Hey, you wanna go drinking?

"We're gonna go drinking over at Chute Park after."

He had a motorcycle, I had a motorcycle,

a couple other buddies, so we go over to the park,

and he was carrying this loaf of bread.

The deli sold bread, and it was just like

a regular loaf of white bread,

and we never sold the darn things.

We'd buy, we'd order one or two from the company.

They'd ship 'em out every morning,

and he's got it, it's in a plastic bag,

and he's got it in the crook of his arm,

and he's walking with this thing.

I'm like, "What are you doing with that loaf of bread?"

He opens the bag up, and he had cut the end of the bread off

and hollowed it out and stuffed a bottle of alcohol

down inside there that he stole from the Vendome Liquor Store.

I'm like, "Nice, that's a great idea."

And it was on.

We were drinking, and so then all of a sudden,

we only needed one or two pan breads before that,

but all of a sudden, we had to order five or six, you know?

And they never sold, and we would all be like, you know,

walking out with all these loaves of bread, you know,

that were hollowed out, and so we'd go shopping, right,

during our shift, and we'd be like,

"Okay, what do we wanna drink tonight?"

When we would drink all the good stuff,

'cause the price was right.

And so we'd just, man, it got to the point

where I was drinking an entire bottle of 750 ML in a night,

like in about three hours from Rome,

and riding my motorcycle at the time.

And I was a blackout drinker,

and I can't tell you how many times I'd wake up in bed

knowing the last thing I remember

was we were drinking at the park,

and jump up, and run out, and open the garage.

There's my motorcycle parked exactly

where it was supposed to be, on the Scrantz home,

and you'd think that would be enough, right,

to stop me, and okay, take a step back.

No, sometimes it would.

That would last six hours, and then I'd start up again, so.

Yeah, I mean, I would ride that motorcycle

like I was on the fast lane to hell.

I mean, it was, I didn't care where it went.

And there was one night, and the guys are telling me,

they're like, "Oh my God, you're so crazy."

The next day, they're like, "Here, you're insane."

I'm like, "What?"

'Cause I blacked out, I don't remember.

And they said, "You looked at us,

"and you looked over at us,

"and you've had this really strange look on your face,

"and you took off through the signal."

They were sitting at a light,

and I took off through the signal.

All the cars are slamming on the brakes,

and I, there I go.

And they said, "We didn't see you after that.

"You were wrong."

And I didn't even remember it.

And it was just, that was what I did.

That was how I partied, you know?

I just, and then while I was working at that deli,

you know, we'd go off and on,

and I'd slow my drinking down a little bit,

and pick it back up.

And then that same guy that hired me, Scott,

came in and said, "Hey, Kelly, come out here.

"I wanna introduce you to somebody."

And granted, I'm 18 years old at the time, right?

So he says, "Hey, this is Ralph.

"Ralph is the manager over at the TGI Fridays.

"And we've come to an agreement

"where his bartenders are gonna come in here,

"and we're gonna give them whatever they want.

"We go there, they're gonna give us whatever we want.

"And nobody's gonna pay for anything."

And I'm like, "That sounds like fair trade."

And so, I had to get a fake ID.

So I went to my buddy's, and he, his brother

was getting rid of his ID 'cause it expired.

And I didn't, I kinda looked like him, but I didn't really.

And he had, he had a mustache.

And I had the, you know, the peach fuzz mustache back then.

And I'm looking at it, and I'm like,

"That's probably not gonna fly."

So I'm like, "How do I look closer to what he looks like?"

And I noticed that his mustache was much darker.

So I went in, and I stole my sister's eyebrow pencil,

and I'm sitting there, and I'm darkening my eye,

my mustache, and I'm like, "That's better," you know?

And so, that got me in.

After a while, they stopped guarding me

'cause I was right in there, so.

But man, we would drink there, and it was the new shoe park.

We were there every night on the weekends drinking.

But one time, back in the day, you know,

other substances were very popular.

And I bought a big bag of mushrooms.

And we ate those mushrooms,

and then we went to the bar drinking.

And they always mix the drinks pretty strong.

But I always tell 'em I want a Stoli Pink Lemonade,

waterproof Stoli, right?

And I'm drinking those things, and I couldn't feel 'em.

I literally could not feel the alcohol.

And I'm like, "What's the matter with you?

"Your hand's damaged, you can't pour more vodka in there?"

And he was pouring, in a big glass,

three quarters of his vodka.

And I was drinking my walk, and I couldn't feel it.

And I'm like, "You know what, let's get outta here.

"Let's go somewhere else."

So now, we decide to start bar hopping.

So we're bar hopping, and I was the designated drunk driver.

And I used to drive a '72 Cadillac Coupe de Ville.

That thing's got, like, a couch in the backseat.

And it's literally four, six feet wide inside the car.

And so, I'm driving that car, and they used to say,

"Hey, you driving?"

And I said, "You guys pay for gas, and I'll drive."

And so, we drove.

And because I grew up here, back then,

when the cops pulled out of West Family Hall,

they wouldn't turn left.

They wouldn't go down into Canoga Park,

and Woodland Hills, West Hills area.

They would come this way, towards the feeder.

They never went that way, 'til they were called.

And the neighbors were fed up with our shit, our strength.

So they called, they were coming and looking for us.

So we had a thing where I would pull up at a spot.

We had about, I had about 15 spots all over.

And we'd pull up, and I'd look at the clock,

see what time it was.

And 15 minutes later, we were gone.

We'd just drink there, party there, do our thing,

and then we'd leave, before the cops could show me.

So we were always bouncing around all over town.

So we're out drinking at TGI Fridays,

drinking pink lemonades, can't feel 'em.

And I decide, okay, it's time, let's go, let's go bar hop.

So we go bar hopping.

We end up out in Nagora.

And we're out in Nagora, and we're drinking,

and all of a sudden, guess what started wearing off,

and what started kicking in.

And I'm like, I'm stumbling, and I'm like, okay.

And I go to my friends, I'm like,

if you guys are in the car,

when I put the key in the ignition,

you'll get a ride home, otherwise you'll walk.

And I get in the car, and they were all there,

and everybody jumped in.

And I start the car, and I take off.

And I'm now, I can feel all the out that I drank all night.

And I'm like, oh, this is not good.

So I'm driving down the 101, I'm coming this way.

I don't know if you guys are familiar

with that Fallbrook off-ramp.

It comes down, and it makes that super tight turn.

It's like 15 miles an hour.

So you gotta go from 70 to 15, and 500 feet.

And I'm falling asleep, and like looking at them,

like wake up, man, I'm rolling down all the windows.

I'm yelling at all the guys,

keep me up, keep me awake, man.

And I'm looking back there, and they're sleeping,

jerking the wheel like this, you know.

Whoa, whoa, and then they wake up,

and then two minutes later, they're all sleeping.

And I'm like, oh, all right, I could get here.

I'm almost home, I'm almost home.

And I see, oh, Fallbrook, oh, here we go,

here's my off-ramp.

Fell asleep on the off-ramp, coming off the freeway,

driving that Cadillac.

Well, this was like a horror movie,

'cause I woke up, and sparks are coming off.

I went into the guardrail.

I didn't hit it straight on, I hit it, side-swiped it.

And sparks are flying off that guardrail,

and I'm like, holy, holy shit.

And I'm like, oh, no, and I can see the turn coming up.

And I cranked the wheel, and I didn't even bother

to try to stop for the stop sign, and I just kept going.

And I'm like, oh, my God, oh, my God.

And now the adrenaline's pumping, and I turn around looking,

and everybody's awake now, you know?

I was like, oh, wow, you guys finally decided to wake up.

And I went back there, and that Cadillac

took out 20 feet of guardrail.

I just snapped all those pieces off.

And I didn't hit it straight on, fortunately.

I side-swiped it, but man, that thing just destroyed

that car, and the car was almost indestructible.

And then it just got to be, you know, just, that was normal.

You know, that was like normal behavior.

And then I was out Christmas Day, 1989,

and it was pouring rain, and I had just got a new car.

And I decided, well, what do you do with a new car?

You see how fishtail's in the rain, right?

That's what we did, right?

So you have to learn, in case it happens, you know,

I'm justifying all this craziness in my head.

And so I go out, and I'm out there trying to get this thing

to fishtail, and it's got front-wheel drive,

and it won't fishtail.

And that's the last thing I remember.

I wake up in bed, and I run out to the car,

and I'm looking for body parts hanging off the car,

limbs, or what have you, damage, nothing.

And I told myself, you know what, that's it, I'm done.

I'm not drinking anymore.

And I had been introduced to AA before.

When I was 18, I got my first DUI,

and so I had gone to AA a bit.

But when I quit in '89, I never went to a single meeting.

I just stopped.

And my girlfriend at the time, that ended up being my wife,

that we were married for 16 years,

and I was with her for like 18 years.

I didn't drink for 18 years, through the whole marriage,

through the whole divorce, nothing.

And it was one of those real fun divorces, so.

And then, after all, everything was settled,

and everything was finalized,

and the kids were coming over on a regular basis.

My alcohols kicked in.

And it had been working out over at the gym

for the last 18 years.

It was ready to go, and it's like,

hey, buddy, how you doing, you know?

Remember me, remember all that fun we used to have?

And so I told myself, well, you know,

I've got pretty good self-control.

I stopped for 18 years.

So if I can keep it under control,

famous last words from an alcoholic, right?

If I can keep it under control, I can drink.

So I told myself, I'll only drink Friday night,

and that's it.

Three beers, and that's it.

And I did that for a year.

And then it got to be where, well,

I don't have a project I'm working on, you know,

Monday, not starting 'til Tuesday or Wednesday,

so, you know, it's Saturday.

It's still the weekend, and then it went from there.

And in a very short period of time,

I went from having a nice place out in Encino,

and the kids were coming over all the time,

and I just threw that all away.

I remember it was my weekend to have the kids over,

and I'd been drinking all week

'cause I didn't have anything to do,

and I was just hammered by the time

they were supposed to come over.

And I was supposed to go pick 'em up,

and there was no way I could drive out there

and I was like, there was no way.

And so I call up and I say, "Hey, I'm not coming."

And I remember my son getting on the phone.

He was 10 years old at the time, and he's crying.

"No, please, Dad, I wanna see you.

"I want you to come get us."

And I said, "No," and I didn't care

because alcohol was more important to me than my own son.

And then after I got off the phone,

I started realizing that I crushed him,

so I just started drinking more to numb those feelings.

And that lasted for about a year and a half,

and I drank myself out of house and home.

And in the process of drinking myself out of house and home,

I would go to, I lived in Encino up there

near White Oak in Ventura, right off the arm.

And they had some pretty good-sized,

older properties in that neighborhood.

You had pretty good square footage in your unit.

So when I started drinking, I'm like,

"Well, you know, I gotta be smart about this.

"I gotta buy alcohol when it's on sale, right?"

So I'd look at the Rite Aid ad and I'm like,

"Oh, look at that, Heineken 12-packs on sale for $9.99.

"I should go get some."

Well, back then, I was working in construction,

so I had a big truck.

So I drove my truck over there

and I threw the dolly in the back.

And I went in to the store,

and the first time I went in there,

I used the Rite Aid cart.

And those carts are really tiny.

They're all like 12-packs of Heineken.

So I was like, "This is just not a day in the life."

So next door was the Ralph's.

So then when I would go back,

I would grab two Ralph's shopping carts,

push it around and put it around behind me.

And I'm like, "Okay, I'm going into the store

"to get some beer," right?

And I just start loading those carts, loading those carts.

And I'm pushing them out to my truck,

and I've got two full carts and 20 cases of beer,

and I'm throwing them out there.

And some guy's walking in, he's like,

"Oh, are you having a party?"

And I'm like, "No, man, that's not for me.

"What are you talking about?"

And so I'd fill the truck, and I'd take it back,

and I'd take the dolly,

and I looked like a beer delivery guy.

I mean, I would go from my truck into my apartment,

my truck into my apartment,

and I'm back and forth and back and forth,

and the neighbors are like, "The heck is this guy doing?"

And I would just, and I'd load them up,

and I'm like, "Okay,"

and I got this special refrigerator that had a lock on it.

So when the kids came over,

they couldn't see what was in the refrigerator,

but I wanted to keep the beer cold, right?

So I had a little key on there, and it was full.

It was a pretty good size refrigerator, and it was full.

And then I'm like,

"Well, where am I gonna put the rest of this beer?"

So I started putting it in my closet.

I had a big closet that stressed wall-to-wall.

I'm stacking it all in there, and I'm like,

"Well, I don't wanna put too much in there

"'cause it's kinda heavy."

"Well, there's a space here behind the door.

"I'll just put it there."

So then I started putting it there,

but then I keep going back to the store and picking up new.

I mean, I went one time to the store,

and I got 20 cases, and I went back and got 20 more.

And I had beer stacked up.

It was probably five feet tall, the size of a pallet.

And I'm like, "Well, how am I gonna find this beer?"

Kids coming in my room.

I'll just put a sheet over that.

So I'd throw a bed sheet over it.

And I must've had, and then not to mention that stack,

I put all the beer inside the closet and the refrigerator

that was full.

And this for a guy that's supposed

to drink three beers a week, right?

So it was just insanity.

It's the only way to describe it.

But in my alcoholic mind, that was okay

'cause I was saving money, right?

You know, and buying that much.

And then when you have that much beer laying around,

it's like, well, you need a few more.

And then that lasted about a year and a half.

And then I ended up, I got caught up in that 2008.

I was a contractor back then, a 2008 housing crash.

And all the business was gone, literally.

And I didn't care 'cause I had stockpiled a bunch of cash

and I just proceeded to drink more.

And then eventually I stopped paying the rent and I was out.

And then I was staying with a friend

and I was over there at their house

and I was digging around in their house.

They were at work, I should have been at work, but I wasn't.

And I'm digging around in their house and I'm thinking,

"Where?"

They gotta get some alcohol or something, right?

And they just opened this one cabinet

on the top shelf in the back.

There was the hard stuff, but I didn't usually drink that,

but I didn't know, right?

So they pull it out and it was the good stuff.

It had the plain label with the blue stripe

and it said tequila.

I'm like, "That'll work."

So I started drinking that and I black out again.

And I come to and my friends that are sitting on the couch

and they're looking like, man, like really concerned,

like what the hell is going on?

And turned out that I was puking my guts out

when they got home and then I went and passed out

and then came out and they come out and I stumble out

and I'm thinking, "Oh man, I got a headache now.

I gotta drink some alcohol."

And so there's no more alcohol 'cause I drank it all,

but they had a couple of bottles of wine

and I'm like, "Let me drink one of those."

And they looked at me and they said,

"You know, you might have a problem with alcohol."

And I said, "Well, I don't think so, but it's your place,

so I guess you're making the rules."

So that night I went to the rafters out in Santa Clarita.

I mean, anybody of you who've ever been there,

there's a big flight of stairs

that leads up to the rafters, the rafter hole.

It's a big, wide set of stairs, probably five, six feet wide

and it goes all the way up there.

And then as I'm walking up there

and going to park in the parking lot,

a little voice in my head, little alcoholic voices saying,

"Don't go there, just lie to him, tell him you went.

Just say, 'Oh, I went, I went.'"

And for some reason my body wasn't listening

and I just kept, I parked the car, I got out,

I went up there and it started getting louder and louder

and louder as I'm getting closer and closer.

And it's screaming at me, "Don't go up the stairs,

don't go up the stairs."

And then I just kept, I was like, "I'm on a plane."

And I started walking up those stairs

and I get up halfway up

and I can see the top of the landing now.

And now the voice is just screaming stuff,

"Go the other way, go the other way."

And I turned around and I looked down the stairs

and it was the most bizarre thing.

The stairs, even though I was like right about

in the middle of the staircase,

the stairs going down looked like they didn't stop.

Like, "Whoa, I think it's shorter this way."

So I went and turned to my first meeting

and I went into that room

and fortunately it was a small meeting.

I was sitting off to the side, you know,

"Don't talk to me, don't look at me,

don't make eye contact with me."

And I'm sitting there and I find myself a seat

and I started looking around and, you know,

you got all this stuff, right?

And I sit down and right directly in front of me

was the promises and I'm like, "Okay."

So I started reading them and I get to number four

and we will know peace.

And that was it, I lost it.

I started sobbing because at that point in my life,

I had no peace.

And so I'm sitting there and my head's spinning

100 miles an hour and I'm thinking to myself,

"Okay, if I can get that one thing from this program,

then I'll stay.

But if I can't get peace, then I'm not gonna stay."

And today, I have peace in my life.

You know, I have the normal, you know,

life's inception type of stuff, you know.

They're quality problems.

I mean, if I told you what the problems were,

you'd be like, "Really, that's your problem?"

You know, and it's funny.

David asked me, he's like, "How you doing?"

You know, I love everything.

I said, "It's good, you know, nothing to complain about."

And it's been a road.

It's been a road.

It was when I first started it, you know, staying sober.

And I really wanted to stay sober this time.

And I was sitting at home, you know, working still.

And I was collecting unemployment at the time.

So I had a little money coming in.

This thing starts up again.

There it goes again.

It's like, "Hey, man, there's a liquor store

right down there."

And I'm like, "No, I really wanna do that."

And the more I said no, the longer it got.

And I'm like, "Okay, wait a minute."

I went to that meeting, where's that phone list?

I see the phone list.

And I remember the guys told me, "Call me anytime."

I'm like, "Okay."

So I start making phone calls.

Voice, man, no hands, voice, man, voice, man,

no hands, no hands, went through like 20 months.

I'm like, "You know what?

Can't use profanity here."

So you know what I was thinking, right?

And I'm like, "That's it."

So I go and I get my shoes

and I start putting my shoes on.

And I put them both on and I got one tonic

and the phone starts blowing up.

And it's everybody that I called.

Like, "Hey man, what's going on?

You okay? What's up?"

And it was just constant and the numbers get...

And then I was on the phone and the phone rang

and that one went to voicemail and then they'd call back.

So all these 20 people are calling me back

and I'm like, "And now I'm making phone calls

or return calls and all this."

And then after it kind of calmed down a little bit,

I looked down at my feet and I'm looking at my feet

and I'm sitting in the chair

and only one of my shoes was tied.

I'm like, "It's kind of cool."

But the obsession was gone to go get the alcohol,

which was the most bizarre thing to me.

I'm like, "That's pretty awesome."

And so that's why I do that fullness.

I did it for years and I just gave it up to another guy.

I did it for the last two years

and that fullness saved my life.

It literally saved my life.

And the only way I stopped drinking this go round

was the men and women in the room for alcoholics and homeless.

I mean, my brain is trying to kill me

with alcohol and drugs, without my consent.

And it'll do it if I let it.

But when I come into the rooms and alcoholics anonymous,

I feel peace.

That's the peace I'm looking for.

And if you're new in these rooms,

I don't know if any of you are new here,

but damn, it's the best time.

People answer phones for this and get this guy,

you know, they'll come down.

I'm bringing donuts.

(laughs)

How'd you bring donuts?

(laughs)

You know, everybody likes donuts,

but doesn't like donuts.

But it's the men and women in these rooms,

you guys saved my life, you know,

and that's why I gladly agreed to come out here.

I've never been to your meeting before,

but I gladly agreed because I wanted to share

my experience with you guys

and hopefully you'll take something away from it.

Thank you.